


numb

by fiddleogold_againstyoursoul



Series: he loves me (not) [2]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Angst, Angst and Feels, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-17
Updated: 2016-07-17
Packaged: 2018-07-22 12:38:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,614
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7439701
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fiddleogold_againstyoursoul/pseuds/fiddleogold_againstyoursoul
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A sequel to frostbite. Will not be any easier on my conscience.</p><p>You're saved. You don't think you deserve to be.</p>
            </blockquote>





	numb

**Author's Note:**

> I apologise for the previous fic. This fic borders less on evoking some sort of reaction from you all and focuses on Bucky trying to piece himself back together again. Happy reading.

you're dizzy with the pain. it's ringing in your ears, white noise and a screaming - is that your voice? it must be. let it be. you can see shapes moving. colours. in front of your nose. around you. you think you remember colours. red, green, blue. blue. _blue._ wait. no. yes. focus.

people are shouting. what's going on? you can't think. you can't think of anything. are you on a mission? you don't know. you don't.

you don't remember.

there's a sound like someone breathing into a microphone. or loudspeaker. or...you don't know. you don't know. you weren't programmed to know these things. where are your weapons? where are the soldiers? where are your orders?

For the first time in a long while, you panic.

It surges up in you. Wave after wave of hot, choking shock. Your vision grows blurrier but you keep moving, trying to gain control of yourself. You stumble. Did you ever stumble? The Winter Soldier never stumbles. He'd be put down immediately. 

You make a little sound in your throat that you don't know how to take back and the person on the loudspeaker clears their throat.

_all HYDRA agents are to drop their weapons. all HYDRA agents are to drop their weapons or they will be shot on sight. we are moving in. we will not wound any agent who has dropped their weapons. we are moving in. any agent that tries to run will also be shot on sight. please stay wherever you are. we are moving in._

you're at a loss. the panic is gone. you don't know. what are your orders? do you comply with the voice over the speakers? you don't know.

(you've never known.)

you move, putting one foot in front of the other. uncertain. unsteady. why do you doubt? who do you doubt? the winter soldier does not doubt.

The spots in your vision grow. You feel your knees give out and grab at something, anything. (Nothing.) You crumple instead, but you can't. You can't lie here. You have to move. Where, doesn't matter. You have to move.  

you crawl. slowly. painfully. what is pain? you don't know. you don't know.

deliberate.

elbows and knees. elbows and knees. you can't see anymore. you close your eyes and drag yourself over the ground. the carpet hurts your elbows and knees. you move anyway. pain. pain. 

What was that thought before, the almost memory?

_memory._

It is a funny word.

it is a funny word all loopy and strange and so foreign "memory" "memory" like "memories" matter 

you crawl. you feel. bruises you don't remember ache. something in you aches, too. what is this aching, this almost want for solace? this pricking of something 

(needles?)

behind your eyes, demanding to be set free.

this trembling of your lower lip

(you think cowardice and you think weakness, but it is "natural" and "reaction" that they tell you after, two words you don't fully grasp the meanings of yet, not now not ever probably)

and this demanding to be somewhere other than here. anywhere other than here, like -

you don't know. you don't -

You grit your teeth. You do not fail. You are not weak. You are a machine. You will find your orders, and you will comply. You move. Slowly, albeit, but you move. Every move you make is a new sensation. You're dizzy. You're weak. (You're not weak.) Your teeth taste like metal. (You don't know what teeth are supposed to taste like.) You think you're bleeding. (You're always bleeding.) A new wave of nausea counters the last, each one more gripping and relentless than its predecessor. Your vision goes yellow.

_i see you_

_stay where you are and put your hands up_

You blink.

_yes you i mean it i have a gun and i will shoot_

It's a girl and she can't be more than twenty. Long blonde hair that flows down to a curvy waist. She's gripping a firearm that looks much too heavy for her. Her figure swims through your vision, there and not, blurry and clear at the same time. You want to scream, but you can't even open your mouth.

_don't breathe too much we blew up some stuff and you might asphyxiate or something_

_stay there i mean it_

she's so young. so young and so naive and her voice is wavering several octaves she's afraid she's scared of you of this it's new to her it's different and you wonder why that makes something explode in your chest something young and something brave and something oh so desperate to claw free

_put your hands up put 'em up i don't wanna shoot you they say there's a guy who i have to look out is it you are you the_

Winter Soldier

You slide your arms in, back to your sides. Empty sides. What happened to your guns, your knives? Not even a single grenade on you. You look back to the girl and have to fight back another wave of nausea. It's killing you. Being helpless. Lying limp. You want to know. You want to try to remember. But that one word

_memory_

is a tricky fucker and it slips away from you time and time again.

_we have medics you don't have to worry they can take care of you and you look pretty scratched up mister_

you slump. you're tired. you're scared. you're so so scared. you're so tired. and yet that word, that elusive word

_memory_

hangs, dangling so close to you. so close. you can touch if you'd like but you don't know how.

_put your hands up_

another voice says, and they're cutting through the room like you remember razors into flesh, drawing red lines over your skin.

 

* * *

 

You often dream about this place. You don't know what it is or why it holds such a certain sentiment to you.

Peeling walls with the occasional crack in them. Floorboards that creak under your weight. A small, equally creaky bed of which springs may be loose. It's a small bedroom, no doubt, but a plain one. So why do you keep coming back here? What does it mean to you? Why does it - you search for the word, mind fogged by your dream state - matter?

There's a desk, too. The chair pulled out and slightly crooked, like someone's just gotten up from it. 

(who?)

In the dreamscape, you move. There's an open sketchbook on the desk. The pages fly though there is no wind - dozens and dozens of rough drafts and sketches. Proportions. Limbs. Faces you don't recognise. You reach out and the pages slip away, dissolve - though that can't be plausible - into puddles of red. The puddles overflow, trickle over the desk and down to the floor. You smell blood. It collects, building up, washing red against your ankles. You can't move. You want to scream. You want to run. 

A sound. Something loud, something that vibrates through the room. 

Someone screaming, too.

You keel over, trying to shut it out. Hands pressed firmly to your ears. 

_i'm okay._

_i'm okay._

_red, green, blue._

 

* * *

 

 

They take care of you. They cleanse you in rose-scented water and stitch up your wounds. They spread stinging ointment on your bruises and polish your metal arm. They want to help, you think, but you don't know why. They always look so sad. They always look so, so sad. You don't need help. You don't need help.

There is good food - meat and vegetables and solid matter that upset your stomach the first few months. Sometimes they still do. Sometimes you forget you have to chew, how to chew and why you need to chew. Chewing is painful, sometimes; there's always this tingling in your teeth and an awful taste, like blood. You eat well. You drink well. Some things taste different in this reality, but you don't know why or how. You don't even remember how they used to taste, just that they are not the same. They are not the food and drink you had before...before what? You are scared of not knowing. You are scared you'll never know.

_you'll get it back_

they say, your memory. In drips and drops at first, then puddles of randomness. They hit you irregularly. You wake up screaming, the only thing on your mind some name foggy in your mind - _Dugan_ and  _Gabe_ \- or something like  _so cold, so cold._ There is always one that hits you the hardest, the one you never remember.

It hits you when they help you out into the gardens and you look up at the sky, a pale blue.

It hits you when you feel the nurses' gentle hands on your skin.

It hits you when the doctors hold you and soothe you and calm you when you're sobbing from a nightmare and it hits you when you fall asleep.

but what is it? you don't know. you're scared you'll never know.

They teach you new things and new words - _amnesia_ and  _ptsd_ and _triggers._ Are proud when you repeat them back to them, smiling in the strange mechanical way they taught you. Smiling is good, they say. Smiling makes people feel good. Something about endorphins, but you're not sure.

They give you, bit by bit like the truth is a powerful drug that can only be administered drop at a time, your backstory. Your memory back. And you slowly unravel underneath them, let them remake you. Let them pull you apart from that - that _thing_ the other them made you, and piece you back together again. But the pieces are missing. You know this as surely as you know there is blood yet that runs through the thin bluish veins on your arms. As surely as you know there is breath yet in your lungs and you breathe. As surely as you know you are alive but this is not  _living._

i'm missing something, you say one day, and the doctors look at you and say

_you're missing more than that._

 

* * *

 

The dream comes back time after time. Again and again. The same old room. The same desk and chair. 

Sometimes you interact differently with things. Sometimes you sink into the creaky old bed instead, and something muffles your vision. You hear laughter. Then you hear a strangled sob. You wake up very quickly after that.

Sometimes you go to the door. The knob will turn from the other end, but no one will come in. You'll keep jiggling it, but the most you can do it break the handle itself. 

And the blood, the blood is ever present.

 

* * *

 

 

 When you're especially stable they bring you photographs. Photographs can be bad or good; they can make you rock and shake with an emotion so deeply buried you cannot even name it or its roots or they can make you cry sweet tears of joy at recognition. In both instances you're ashamed of your reactions. They soothe you, tell you it's okay -  _natural reaction,_ they say, crying. But you've never found tears to come easily.

You start to point out faces

_that's little Billy_

_that's Logan from next door_

_that's my mum_

and they always look at you and smile in that sad little way. You go to sleep and forget them all over again and the next day they bring you the album and you're saying the names again, rolling them round and round on your tongue as if that will make that one word

_memory_

so much easier to grasp.

The photographs are nice, but they don't fulfill you. That hunger inside you, keen to know more about yourself. To map yourself out all over again, reborn in a new light.

You've got bits of Bucky back in you - you've got his lopsided grin and his winks and the way he talks and his gait - but you've got plenty yet that are not. The Winter Soldier lives in you yet. You're afraid of those words, afraid of what they can do to you. The doctors tell you it'll be okay. They say you'll get better. But you don't understand. You don't understand why they want you to get better. What do they get out of it?

There are new things in this world other than photographs, things like c-e-l-l-p-h-o-n-e-s. Little TV screens that light up with different colours and those colours move when you swipe your fingers across, and they're exactly like phones of the past except smaller and brighter: they make your eyes hurt, but they're absolutely fascinating. A doctor of yours swipes to show you entire albums of his cat when you both are bored. There are also new phrases and words, and references you don't get - funny little creatures called  _Pokemon_ and entire movie and book franchises that you spend ages poring over in your free time.

(You're a Gryffindor. That shouldn't make you feel as happy as it does.)

They're good to you, these people. They tell you that once you're better, once you regulate and once the panic attacks lessen, you get to resume - or try to - what they call a "normal life". But the serum lives in you, and the Winter Soldier lives yet, and you're repulsed by who you once were and who you are now. Most of all you're afraid - you're afraid all the little

_memories_

all the little things coming back to you will once again, like everything else, prove to be nothing more than a dream.

 

* * *

 

"Hi," She says, and you think you recognise her. "Recognition" is another word you can grasp now, a word than can settle in your mind and be digested. You smile.

"Hi."

She comes closer, and you immediately wrench away. Something - bright, clear - shoots through you and you make a grab for weapons that aren't there, for weapons that have never been there since they saved you. You think

_don't hurt me_

and she backs away, eyes wide.

"I'm so sorry - I didn't - I'm -"

You stare at her like a mouse at a cat about to pounce, curling into yourself. There'd been another flash of that word

_memory_

but you don't know what it is. Slowly, you unfurl again. "Sorry," You repeat.

"Do you know who I am?"

_you saved me._

"You found me," You say stupidly. Not sure what the words spilling from your lips are, when the thought in your head was more apt. But "save"...that's not a word you're prepared to say, yet. Who says you can't doom yourself all over again, peel away from the thing they've remade you into and revert? "Saving" is relative.

She smiles, and you see a gap between her two front teeth. She's pretty. Blonde hair.  _Green eyes._ You blink, but it's gone again. 

"I can't take all the credit. We'd been lookin' for you for a long time, Soldier."

"Why didn't you shoot me?"

You have no verbal filter. The words come and go, even if they may be only snippets of what you want to say. 

"We wanted to take you alive. See if you could be..." Her expression changes into one of almost pity. "...saved. But we did consider it. Shooting you."

"Clara," A doctor warns from where he is in the corner, but she waves him off.

"He would prefer the truth, wouldn't he? Do you remember the time you spent as HYDRA's weapon, Mr -"

"Barnes."

"Mr Barnes?"

You hesitate -

you think swirling and you think of the cold and you think of blood on your hands under your nails flowing through taps and down drains. you think animal odour and peeling skin and bruises that will never fade. you think training and dying and never being able to fully die

\- and you press your hand against your temple and will the horrible images to fade.

"I killed people," You say. The words do not sound like you are saying them. They feel like they're tattooed on your skin, a permanent reminder of the things you have done. "I killed tens of thousands...all because they wanted me to."

You don't remember a single face. You remember screaming. A cold blooded passion eating away at every conflict you had inside.

"It wasn't you." Clara eases towards you, voice calm - even if it is wavering. You look at her and there is nothing but sincerity in her green eyes. "They made you that way. You understand? Our doctors here are trying to help you remember who you were before they brainwashed you." She is so young, you think again, so young and so strong. Fighting in this war of ours.

"I killed people."

"In every crime you committed," She says, levelling her eyes with you. "There were two victims. The first one was the person in front of the gun. The second was the one pulling the trigger."

You inhale. Digesting that.

"The memories will come back. You will remember." 

"What happens then? After I remember?"

She lowers her eyes to her hands, bruised and calloused and nothing like a youngster's should be. You dimly remember a struggle. Clamps around your arms. Someone screaming but no voice coming out, a throat raw from emotion. "Then you live," She says, as if living is as simple as that.

 

* * *

 

Sometimes in the dreams you cry out. You scream for someone, anyone. And yet no one comes. The blood reaches your hips, a great big pool of it. Sometimes you think that if you called the correct name, said the correct thing, it'd go away.

But you don't know the name.

The name of the person who was sitting in the chair, drawing.

 

* * *

 

 

There are arguments spoken in whispers and deals made in hushed, however angry, tones, and your life is spared. This, you understand. This, was a long time ago, before the doctors stitched the parts of you back together. But there are people who dislike you yet, who do not trust you with any inch of their fibre despite what the reports are saying: that you are getting better.

you don't blame them. you don't trust yourself, either. you don't know.

(when did you know?)

You're back, lying on your bed, the doctors standing like passive angels above you.

"Who are you?"

"James Buchanan Barnes," You snap to immediately. They smile, smooth over your brow. You're sweating again, always are.

This time they do something different. Normally they pass over the book of photographs, let you file through each of them and make what you can of them. Sometimes you are even able to recognise someone new. Someone you hadn't noticed before, someone whose name you can remember. Ghosts, wisps of memories, blowing by, here and not, there and gone again. This time, however, they hand you a file instead.

**THE WINTER SOLDIER**

it reads, and dread swallows your heart whole.

 

* * *

 

So you spend every moment you have in that nightmare screaming out the names you do remember. Ma. Becka. Bailey. Your officer from training. None of them work. None of them come to your aid. They're long dead, now, your family and friends of the past. Nothing but stones and photographs and names to remember them by, because

_memories_

they don't work for you.

 

* * *

 

 

You read, and you learn.

You learn of the things you've done, the things these people - so kind so warm so magnificent and so full of grace - have forgiven you for.

Murders and mass genocide and missions carried out in secret.

Names you don't remember and pictures of bloodied scenes you left behind.

They hover over you as you read, gauging your reaction. They will have none to judge. Your face muscles are numb, but the same pricking sensation lasts behind your eyes - you think you're going to cry, but you hold back the tears. There is nothing but the cold again, washing over you, like a new baptism of horror. And it never seems to stop.

You do cry when you see the photographs, the profiles of people you have assassinated. Photographs of men holding smiling children on their laps. Photographs of families. Photographs of people and their pets. You cry, you break down because you know that somehow, some part of you was buried with them, and some part of you was fighting as you are now, even through the cold. You put your head in your hands and you sob, but somehow crying makes it worse. The doctors don't say a word. They leave you in your room, crying your eyes out for people you don't remember.

Would you rather remember, shoulder the weight of thousands of souls?

(some part of you, selfish, says fiercely,  _no)_

you are back in the trenches, you think. the cold bites. you shiver and curl into yourself. someone motions you closer, a face you cannot remember, and there's a blinding flash and a deafening bang and you hit the ground. you know fear. this is fear. fear is reaching out and knowing that any second a blade can take those fingers away. fear is screaming for your comrade on a dusty battlefield and him answering after some delay. fear is looking at someone you love and fear is -

You press the heels of your palms into your closed eyes as far as you can without it being dangerous as if that will make them stop, the visions. This is fear, you think. Uncertainty. 

There's something yet, something about the photographs that hurt you worse than the reports do. And there's something in this file that you feel will complete you, for the better or for worse. A 

_memory_

hanging ever so close, the forbidden fruit of Eden.

You fall asleep with the tears drying on cheeks long since drained of all flush.

THE WINTER SOLDIER creeps into your dreams, and strangles you with his eyes half shut. He's frozen in ice, too.

 

* * *

 

_who are you?_

i am james buchanan barnes. of the 107th.

 _you are not barnes._ The Winter Soldier sneers. He curls his fingers around his knife and uncurls them after a moment's deliberation.  _you will never escape me, you know. they dug too deep. they dug bit by bit of you out of your head and put me inside. you can never be free._

i know.

 _so why do you fight?_ He sounds incredulous.

i fight because i remember.

_you fight to forget._

you, You agree, and everyone else.

 

* * *

 

red green  _blue_

_something about the end_

it's back again this thought this horrible thing i don't understand it why does this mean so much to me i can't reach it yet i can't reach it

you wake. the day has not yet broken. there is only darkness. you are lying askew on your bed, and you can see nothing but black ahead of you. every rustle hurts your ears. every sound feels like you're back on the table again.

you lie there, afraid and cold and alone, till the sunlight drifts in through the curtains and you can see the wreck you've made of yourself again.

The doctors come back, and they do not speak a word about how they left, but they never let you see the file again. (Its contents burn themselves into your mind. A permanent tattoo.)

 

* * *

 

There is less blood. Night after night. But somehow you feel with a sinking feeling that it does not, will not, mean anything. 

You eat more. Eager.

You talk. Smile. Interact.

You want to leave, to find - to find what? you don't know. you don't know.

(But you do.)

 

* * *

 

 

"Mister, what happened to your arm?"

You look to the direction of the voice and you see a little girl in overalls and pigtails, a quizzical look on her freckled face. Her mother rushes up, flushing."Don't mind Cheryl," She says hurriedly. "She doesn't mean to be rude."

"I don't mind." You absently rub at your metal arm. Sometimes you forget it's not real, sometimes you forget you used to have one of flesh. Not that you can remember much of that one, either. Memory still fails you, somehow. The human mind is a funny thing. (and you'd know.) "Well, Cheryl, I got into an...accident. But I'm all better now." And the trademark grin and wink. Cheryl giggles. It's a nice sound. (it won't be in a few years, and you know it. it'll be high and grating.)

"Did it hurt? It looks so cool!"

"I don't remember," You reply. Not untruthfully, either. "Cheryl's got spunk. Curiosity isn't a bad thing, Mrs -"

"Jones," She smiles, and you see the uncanny resemblance between mother and daughter...the same long blonde hair, the same sweet smile and twinkle in blue eyes.  _Blue eyes._ You stumble for a bit, but quickly regain yourself: you'll have plenty of time to ponder that later. She's looking at you, an expression akin to concern flashing over her face. "I'm sorry. Is something wrong?"

"No, no. I just...you remind me of someone."

cher and bucky.

Cheryl and James.

You almost laugh at the comparison. Blonde hair and blue eyes to boot. 

"You know, I get the same feeling." Mrs Jones leans closer and laughs, as if you're both co-conspirators, and you realise you're being hit on. By a married woman, if the ring on her left ring finger says anything, at that. You find a way to disentangle yourself from this sticky situation and step off the train on the next stop, blowing Cheryl a kiss goodbye first. You earn yourself another giggle and a red face. Good. (She'll probably go to the Smithsonian and scream her head off, but that's a thought for another day.)

(did it hurt?)

_i don't remember._

It's been a few years since you were declared stable. Free to go. You stare at the masses of people shoving themselves into crowded trains and your arm sparks, almost to reflect your current mood. It would hurt if the nerves in the stump still even worked. As it is, you rub at it again and try to brush off the strange look you get from a passing stranger. The world of today is an odd one, but you are certainly the oddest thing you know of. 

The questions they ask sometimes hurt. Things like

_do you remember every man you killed_

_are you safe to be around_

_will you start killing people again if you get the chance_

but worse, things of pity. Things of empathy. Things that scream  _I'm a good person, I want to help._

_have you eaten_

_are you sleeping well_

You'r afraid. You're afraid you'll let down those who believe in you, Clara and the doctors and everyone else who voted for your survival. They could have had you put down then and there, but they saved you. They put you back together and shoved you back onto your feet. Here you are, now, little and broken in a world full of whole pieces of people. But here you are.

at what cost?

You curl your fingers, curl them tight, into little balls of anger. Something rises in your throat, a lump of helplessness, something deeper than you. Something bigger. You want to cry. You want to cry. You want to cry.

You're numb with the cold.

 

* * *

 

oh, you think, standing over the grave, calla lilies in your hand. oh.

she smiles yet in heaven, and all the angels sing.

oh.

blonde hair and blue eyes and hot cocoa on a cold night.

i'm sorry, you think, and it chokes you. i'm so sorry. i'm so sorry so sorry so sorry so sorry

 

* * *

 

 

You navigate through the pages one by one with the hand of a lover, tender and hesitant and sweet. Thumbing each one so slowly, so carefully. Gentle. Even though part of you wants to drop the book into a fire and watch the pages curl away into ashes. 

_how do you burn something that's burned you?_

you know. you've always known. since the day they found you. you know what you did. you know who that was. you know the name and you know the face because fuck, they could never take that away from you. not him. no one. you know who he is and you know what it felt for ages after you did it and you know what you felt when you realised what you did. you know the tears you didn't shed. you know the tears you did. 

You know every single excruciating detail about killing Steve.

Steve. Steve and his baby blue eyes

_i got a lot of problems, Buck_

and 

_you only think she's pretty cos she's got a big rack_

and 

_d'ya think that Cheryl girl kinda looks like me?_

Steve and his paint-covered fingers

_i'm not a little kid, quit coddling me_

and

_i'm okay_

and

_bucky, bucky, bucky_

Steve. steve. Small. Not. Yours. Not. Never yours. Never, ever yours. Not once. Not in this lifetime. Not in the last.

Your breath stills when you find the page. Your thumb hovers over it, uncertain. 

the smell of his soap and the smell of him on you the way he smiles the way he laughs the way he kisses you how he runs and how he moves how he drags you back into the water and up again how he buries his head in your chest how he saves you again and again how it's you who save him from alleyway bullies even though it's you who needs the most saving

the taste of his mouth so warm so soft so scared moving under yours hands in your hair hands on your waist tugging shoving pulling pushing does he want? does he want like you do?

(no)

(he's never wanted like i did)

You close your eyes. For a moment, you're lost to the world. You're standing where you were the afternoon before, in the Smithsonian, staring at the exhibit dedicated entirely to the Star Spangled Man and his many escapades. Or the many escapades he made before he was mysteriously put down by a gunman who was not named. You move towards the moving pictures - his smiling face, blond hair combed back neatly not unlike the Steve you remember, blue eyes twinkling brightly back at you. You raise your hand, open your mouth - and he's gone again, and you're left with the memory of what you did to him.

_(bucky)_

It  _hurts._ More than you think, it hurts so fucking much. Steve was the only thing keeping you alive when they strapped you to the table and put the ice - the serum, you now think - into you. Steve was the only thing on your mind when you rolled out of bed to join the Commandos day after day. Steve was the only reason you needed to keep going, and you were the one to take him away from yourself.

You were the one. You killed him.

(even though I said I'd protect you)

(even though I told you I got this, I got us)

_that wasn't me_

_(it was)_

_it wasn't me_

_(you could've fought it)_

You're standing where you were a week before. On the bridge where it happened. Where you killed the person you loved the most. You're standing there and you can feel the rush, you can hear the blood in your ears and feel how you falter when you see that expression

_recognition_

flash over his face. His pretty, pretty face. Oh, god. Oh, sweet Jesus. Please. Stop. Stop this. Stop it. Please, stop it.

_Bucky?_

_(who the hell is Bucky)_

You hear the gun-shot. Over and over, you see him crumple. You see the shock set in before the bullet catches him square in the forehead. The force propels him backwards. You see millions and millions of things in your head as he flies

(falls)

his eyes rolling

the red rings on his arms

the paint on his fingers

the smile on his face

his pretty pink lips so soft so warm

baby blues so bright and twinkly

him saving you

peggy carter and the way he smiles at her

_if it were for Steve you would wade through a sea of your own blood_

Your stomach lurches. You heave to the side, retching, but nothing comes up but blood. 

(I love you I love you so much I never told you I love you so fucking much Stevie)

The gunshot. The gunshot. Screaming. Him falling. Blue eyes wide in shock.

(bucky)

_you don't gotta be brave anymore, steve. i'll be brave enough for the both of us._

You can barely see through the mist of your tears. You can't speak, there's something rich filling your throat, choking you up, making it difficult to breathe. You loved him so. You loved him, you think, and you bury your face in your hands and you cry till you can't anymore, the drops wetting your eyelashes and your face and dripping onto the book you found lying in the apartment steve used to own

(why would he put it here why)

the pages open but this time your touch doesn't make them dissolve this time it's worse because these are the drawings he never let you see the drawings that make no sense to you 

(is that me?)

it's steve's pencil and steve's fingerprints smudging over them and you think this is what dying feels like, choking on your own grief. rough sketches. barely sketches at all. yellowed pages with time but they're steve's. they're steve's. they're steve's and so are you

(you've always been steve's.)

 

* * *

 

 

red green  _blue_ and a sunset that never fades from your mind.

 

* * *

 

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> You can find me on Instagram @asian_dreamdaddy or on Tumblr [ here.](http://theswiftone27.tumblr.com)


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